"You're making me WHAT?"

Lady Maka Albarn, only daughter of Lord Spirit Albarn, stalked forwards towards her father's seat. The vast hall was all but empty and her words echoed through the room, adding weight to the words issued from her slight frame. Spirit, for his part, cringed backwards under the weight of his daughter's barely restrained fury.

"I know this is sudden, but…" He trailed off with a sigh and bowed his head. "You know as well as I do that we have no other choice."

Maka's shock and outrage ebbed and faded at his words, and she sighed in a counterpoint to her father's earlier exhalation. She knew all too well. Ever since her mother returned to her own kingdom of origin, relations with them had been increasingly strained – and recently, thinly-veiled indications of an oncoming war had crept into the missives received from their diplomats. Their domain's only hope was to form an alliance with one of the neighboring nations to bolster their strength, and the only way to do that was through a marriage. Not that marriage bonds were enough to keep Mama here, she thought bitterly, before collecting herself and returning her gaze to her father.

"Very well. I'll…" She paused, swallowing down her pride. Kingdom before self, after all. The mantra that had defined her childhood and her education echoed through her thoughts once again as she steeled herself to continue. "I'll do it."

Spirit smiled sadly. "That's my girl."

"I do have one request, however." Maka's frosty tone made it abundantly clear that whatever request was forthcoming was a command, and a condition of her cooperation. Even so, Spirit perked up slightly at the opportunity to curry favor with his semi-estranged daughter in the wake of his unwelcome announcement. Noting his receptive attitude, Maka continued.

"I wish to spend time getting to know my… betrothed," she said, carefully burying the underlying vitriol, "before the wedding day. Surely that's not too much to ask?" The question was worded much more softly, the tone almost one of supplication.

Spirit smiled, pleased to be able to deliver an affirmative response for once. "That's already been arranged, actually. You see, Lord and Lady Evans requested some time ago for you to meet their son when the betrothal was proposed."

"The Evans family?" Maka asked, brow furrowing. She recognized the name. If she remembered correctly (and she nearly always did), they ruled a moderately sized domain to the west of her family's kingdom and kept a large standing body of trained warriors. Gaining their loyalty through marriage would certainly be a tremendous aid if there was to be a war, but there was only one problem. "I thought their son was already married?

"The older one is, yes. You're to be wed to the younger."

Maka grimaced. She'd only ever seen him once, at one of the numerous social functions a lady of her status was expected to host and attend. He'd slipped away before she could so much as greet him, leaving her with only a vague impression of white hair and shadowed, burgundy eyes. So this was her betrothed: a second-born and likely a near total shut-in.

She sighed. This was certainly going to be pleasant.

Soul paced the floor of his spacious bedroom, tugging at the uncomfortably tight collar of his shirt. He should have expected this, really. His family was one of the more affluent of the nobles, and most boys his age had been betrothed for several years. It was only living in his older brother's shadow, as well as his natural tendency towards aloofness, that had kept him out of the lineup this long. Now his brother was married, he was betrothed to Lord Albarn's daughter, and there was nothing he could do about it. He only had a vague memory of her from the only social event his parents had ever forced him to attend. She had been radiant in the light of the chandelier, he remembered, smiling and laughing and probably saying all the right things to all the right people in exactly the way he'd never been able to. He'd ducked out onto one of the balconies as soon as he could after arriving, breathing easier after being released from the press of people in the ballroom. Soul hadn't reentered the room until the event was over, hadn't even spoken to the girl. But he remembered her eyes.

Glancing up at the small clock, Soul cursed softly before turning to exit his room. Lord Albarn and his daughter would be arriving soon, and he was definitely required to be present for it. Grimacing briefly at the prospect, he quickly forced his face back into the mask of composure and politeness that his parents expected of him. He wished Wes was still around. His brother was worlds better than him at… basically everything, really, but especially at navigating the social niceties born of the status that bound them hand and foot. Soul had little patience for such things, but since Wes was gone, he would have to play nice to his… fiancée.

He still couldn't really believe it.

Rounding the last corner before the central staircase, a broad and sweeping thing that practically screamed 'overstated affluence', Soul took a deep breath to steel himself for the upcoming ordeal. And an ordeal it certainly would be, since there really wasn't anything else for it to be. He scoffed, the small noise harsh against the heavy silence. He wasn't exactly a catch, he knew that, even with his family name. The best he could hope for out of this was for Lady Maka Albarn to not actively despise him.

Descending the staircase, he saw his parents already waiting in front of the heavy front door. Their arms were linked, although the cold distance between them belied the intimacy of the gesture. His father glared at him for his near-tardiness as he took his place beside them, settling into stillness mere minutes before the doors opened to reveal the family to whom they would soon be allies.

As soon as Soul saw her, exactly two things were made painfully apparent to him.

The first was that she was beautiful. She wasn't busty or curvaceous, but she had a slender elegance that was impossible to ignore.

The second was that he was completely and utterly screwed.